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tv   All In With Chris Hayes  MSNBC  April 16, 2013 8:00pm-9:00pm PDT

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for privacy. for the most part, that's been resprekted. certainly, we respected that. we are not looking to intrude at this moment. they are getting the support they need from the >> good evening from new york. tonight, there are no suspects in the attack on the boston marathon. the fbi says they do not know whether it was a single person or a group. no one has claimed responsibility. the range of both summits and motives is still wide open and with the nation's nerves frayed, there's another developing story we are monitoring. nbc news has confirmed a letter sent to senator roger wicker was intercepted and initially tested positive for the poison, ricen. pete williams will join us with the latest on this story. but first, while we may not know
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anything about who attacked the boston marathon yesterday or why, just over 24 hours after the explosion, there is a lot of new information tonight about the devices used in the attack. about to exekt from the investigation. there were two explosive devices which exploded yesterday. no more along the route or city of boston. the devices appear to have consists of explosive and shrapnel put into pressure cookers. they have recovered black nylon bags at the sights of both devices. they are believed to have been used to transport the devices to the scene. what happens next is that every single fragment of bomb material recovered from those sites will be sent to an fbi land in quantico, virginia, where they can be analyzed by the fbi and
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atf experts and even checked for dna. investigators have launched a major push to seek information from the public, including tips on suspicious behavior and photo and video taken around the race. >> the person who did this is someone's friend, neighbor, co-worker or relative. we are asking anyone -- in any way that indicated that he or she may target the event to call us. someone knows who did this. >> crime scene has been shrunk from about 15 blocks yesterday to about 12 today. authorities say they will continue to work to open streets back up. that the area surrounding the sites will likely be closed for a couple of more days. we have new information about the victims. more than 170 were injured. around 70 remain hospitalized tonight.
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the chief of trauma at mass general hospital spoke to us this afternoon about treating some of the most gravely injured victims. >> they're really amazing people. some of them woke up today with no leg. and they told me they're happy to be alive. they thought as this things happen, they told me that they thought they would die as they saw the blood spilling out. they thought they would lose their life right there and then and as they woke up today from surgery and they saw that they're not dead, they feel extremely thankful and some told me they feel lucky. it's almost a paradox to see these patients without an extremity to wake up an feel lucky. >> tragically different story for the three killed in yesterday's bombing. one, a graduate student at boston university, the university has confirmed a student was among those killed, but is not releasing the student's name yet. 29-year-old krystle campbell was
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killed. her grandmother says she always went out to watch the race. according to the the globe, she had moved to arlington, massachusetts, about a year ago after helping her grandmother recover from surgery. she told the globe she took care of me for two years after the operation. today, her mother also spoke to reporters about losing her daughter. >> she was always smiling and friendly. couldn't ask for a better daughter. we can't believe this is happening. she is such a hard worker in everything she did. just doesn't make any sense. >> grandmother says krystle would have celebrated her 30th birthday next month. and there is 8-year-old martin richard. my wife and daughter are both recovering from serious injuries, we thank our family
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and friends for their thoughts and prayers. i ask you continue to pray for my family as we continue to are remember martin. a schoolmate told the boston globe the two played together on fridays, saying they liked to draw sports pictures. she said martin's younger sister who was injured in the explosion tried to do everything martin did. a vigil got underway about 30 minutes ago near the boy's home. interfaith service for everyone killed and wounded is set for thursday. tonight, the white house announced the president will travel to boston to speak at the service. joining us now with the latest from boston, ron allen and ron, i have to imagine today was a tremendously somber day in the city of boston. >> i think it was just profoundly disturbing. so many people i talked to were just upset. particularly because we learned about the three victims. a young boy, 8 years old.
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he lived in a town, an area of boston called dorchester, a hard working neighborhood that so many people here can relate to. the woman was from an area called medford, another very boston place and a graduate student here like so many others here, the third victim. here at the hospital, we learned today that several of the patients who are in the most critical condition woke up from medically induced comas today for the first time. maybe four or five of them and were able to speak to doctors about what they had been going through. the doctors with were saying they were trying to keep all this business, but it was an indication of how series some patients still are here. the number of critically injured patients rose from 17 to about 22 or 24 and the doctors we were
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talking to were saying it is going to be several days before they can determine whether these patients will leave intensive care, so the road to stability is bumpy and unsure. we have been trying to talk to some of the families, trying to see loved ones and trying to spend time with loved ones and the hospital staff said it's just too soon, that this is still too raw and too touch and go yet before these families want to talk to the media. some want to talk to us because they want to world to hear their stories, but it's still a very delicate situation. all across town, i think it's that feeling of anxiety, that feeling of resiliency as well. i noticed that the boston bruins here are going to play hockey tomorrow night. which will be a big gathering here and obviously, a lot of tears will be shed in that arena in that place, again, one of the quint herbally boston place, but again, because we learned so much about these individual victims, just profoundly disturbing, but still, a lot of
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signs of resilience and that this community is determined to continue on. chris? >> ron allen from boston. thank you very much. let's go to charles pierce from esquire magazine who joins us from newton, mass. i really liked the piece you wrote today. it looks like with the bruins back that some sense of normalcy tomorrow in boston as life starts to get back up and back to normal. obviously, the area in the middle, in downtown is still going to be closed off, but some beginning creeping signs of normalcy as the city enters a mourning period now that we know who exactly has died. >> an unfortunate way to put it. it isn't significant though, the area that will be closed off. this is the center of the city. this is the center of tourism. this is where everything starts. the center of the shopping districts of the high rent
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restaurant districts. with it closed down, the emotional and the kind of emotional and literal geography of the city will be changed for quite some time. >> i couldn't help but note we just saw some photos of the candle light vigil and obviously, the story of an 8-year-old dead i think particularly coming on the wake of newtown so recently. there's something, i think there's a particular emotional rawness americans feel right now. in the face of something as horrifying and tragic as a child being killed, but it seemed to me there was a specific kind of emotional force to learning that bit of information today that who exactly this 8-year-old boy who had died was. >> i think that the entire story that he was there to watch his
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four finish the marathon and he was waiting there to go greet his father, then having this happen. i think you know, as any great story teller and i'm not putting myself in any categories, the accumulation of detail is what brings the emotional impact and i think the accumulation of detail as we learned his name, where he was from, why he was there and he became i think, you know, i think he became the symbol. not a symbol, per se, but the boston marathon has always been an open festival of all of us. nobody really cares except for some of the media who wins and who loses or finishes third or fifth of who qualifies for the olympics. it's all about your uncle bob from nashville who put on a cow suit and ran for four hours. people running for different fund raising things and people running with their fiance's name on their chest and stuff like
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that. why there are always people who wait in back bay every year for the people who are straggling in in five and six hours in the dark. so you can let these people know that somebody appreciates what they're trying to do. >> charlie, i asked you this yesterday and it seems to me and i'm not on the ground there, so i'm curious to hear you, how citizens of boston feel about the local response. just in terms of the amount of information they're being given by mayor patrick, the mayor, the commissioner of police davis. whether there's a sense this is being handled in an efficient, effective and calm manner so far. >> i think that first of all, i think both governor patrick and commissioner davis did themselves a great service last night at that press conference that took place while your show was on the air. governor patrick slapping down that alex jones idiot, then commissioner davis producing
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really the only piece of information at that press conference, which is that the gentleman in the hospital was not a suspect. and commissioner davis was quite firm about that. and i think they both did themselves a great service and the city a great service by being as definitive in pfotenhauer cases as they are. this is so far been a very locked down investigation. very little leaking. there's talk now about finding photographs before the event and whether or not the security along boylston street was at tight as it should be. >> charlie, i want to just jump in for a second so the viewers can see on the left is live images of the candle light vigil being held in dorchester moments ago, not live, for the 8-year-old victim of the bombings yesterday. martin richard. there is a candlelight vigil being held in his neighborhood of dorchester and tons of people out for that. from washington, we have nbc
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news justice correspondent, pete williams. thank you so much for being with us. it to get to the investigation and what we know, the latest on that, but first, i want to begin with these ricin reports. a letter sent to roger wicker did test positive. how serious should we take this? what are the odds of a false positive? i'd like to get a little context before we start ringing the alarm bell. >> let's understand what the results come from. all mail to the u.s. capitol is sent to an off sight facility where it's tested for all kinds of things. the envelope was found, pulled out of the mail supply and a field test was done. it was also positive, but these tests i must say, are oftentimes wrong. we've had field tests on mail at the capitol that have tested positive for ricin. i remember one at a mail sorting machine that testing positive and it was paper dust from the mail machine. they take the material, they
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send it to a lab where it's cultured and then they'll see if there is actually ricin and if there is, then it's a pretty serious matter. there's no, no one is suggesting anything connection between this an boston. obviously, the mail would have had to have been sent before the boston thing. and the other thing is sending a letter to a member of congress is a very directed, personal thing, where as setting off a bomb in a crowded place, obviously, you're trying to, you have a whole different goal. >> pete, let's turn now to the latest on the investigation. we have some photos that have been released by a local news station that appears to show some kind of suspicious package along the parade route. you can see it there highlighted
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there on the left and then another photo of that same spot moments after the explosion. we have confirmation it seems from sources, both publicly on the record and also in reporting, about apparently, what looks to be a pressure cooker bomb and bb and nails packed in with explosives lugged using some kind of bags to the scene. is that about where things are now? do we know anything beyond that? >> what we know for sure is that the bombs were made using a pressure cookers. there are some photographs starting to circulate that clearly show parts of pressure cookers. the brand name is on one of them. the pressure that the cooker can withstand is stamped into the metal. there's no question they were in pressure cookers and the fbi has acknowledged that. they've also acknowledged that the bombs had ball bearings and
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nails to further amplify the destructive power and try to inflict maximum casualties and in terms of what made them go, that's believed to be smokeless powdered gun powder in essence and the mere fact there was smoke you could see after the blast, smokeless powder will smoke, just not as much as old fashioned black powder. that's not a high explosive. in some categories, not even classed as an explosive. it's gun powder. not like dynamite or plastic explosive, but whether that leads in one connection or another, whether this is domestic or foreign, the recipe is sadly all over the place. you don't have to look very hard to find it. the al-qaeda magazine inspire has the recipe, but a lot of other places do, too. >> we should be clear, it does not narrow down the universe of people that could do this. >> no, but on the other hand,
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the fact that the explosive was gunpowder, that these pieces were fairly big, means that investigators will have a lot to go on. they've all been sent to the fbi crime lab in quantico. what's happening right now, they know what brand pressure cooker there is. now, they're trying to find out where do you buy these, what, truly, what part of the country sells them. let's go now and find out who sold them in the last couple of months. this is the sort of thing which the fbi excels. sheer force of numbers. chasing down all these leads. they'll find out and i know this from past investigations. i'm not making this up. they will see if there's electrical tape, what kind was it. when was it made? can we find a lot number and in all these things, they'll be looking for fingerprints just in case the bomb maker got sloppy. >> thank you. charlie pierce, stay with us. up next, the latest from a
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forensic expert on how all the pieces of the investigation are being put together. that's coming up. humans. even when we cross our t's and dot our i's, we still run into problems. namely, other humans. which is why at liberty mutual insurance, auto policies come with new car replacement and accident forgiveness if you qualify. see what else comes standard at libertymutual.com. liberty mutual insurance.
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responsibility.
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we'll talk to an agent on the case of the 1996 bombing, that most closely resembles the marathon explosion. stay with us. with the spark cash card from capital one... boris earns unlimited rewards for his small business. can i get the smith contract, please? thank you. that's three new paper shredders. [ boris ] put 'em on my spark card. [ garth ] boris' small business earns 2% cash back
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city. officials today repeatedly urged the public to turn in information they have to authorities. >> we are looking for the public's cooperation. if there's any video, any photographic evidence. please contact the fbi hotline or the city's hotline. >> various video submissions of the area around the crime scene, crime scenes, that were taken around the time of the blast, both before and afterwards. all video like this, we encourage the public and particularly business owners in that area to continue to submit this information. this is very, very important. >> the 24-hour hotline this you need has information also. 617-635-4500. >> want to bring in grant fredricks, a former police officer and coordinator of vancouver forensic unit in canada. also a contract director at the fbi national academy in
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quantico, virginia. the first thought anyone watching has to have is how do you begin to go through the sheer amount of day that that must be streaming in given the amount of people that were there, half a million people, given the amount of cell phones that people have these days. what do you do? what does day one look like in the video investigation? >> day one for the people in charge of the video part of the investigation is one of an overwhelming event. for them, they are going to be inundated and are being inundated with video sources from hundreds of different proprietary formats. they'll probably end up with many thousands of hours of video clips and likely hundreds of thousands or more of still aimages. the best model for this kind of investigation just occurred in vancouver, canada, when after vancouver lost the stanley cup in 2011 to boston, they had a riot and vancouver did the same
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callout request and ended up with 5,000 hours of video for a riot. at the boston marathon, you had hundreds of thousands of people with video cameras. every person with a cell phone has an evidence collection device and were collecting evidence unknowingly and they have that evidence and police want to get i. the problem is, they want to get the right kind of evidence. they don't want the public to do their own editing to decide what depose to the police. the police should get it all. >>s in case of vancouver, you have tremendous amount of video of a very chaotic event. how do you make sure you find a needle in the hey stack? >> number one, you don't want the public to look at their video and send you images of the fire, the bombing, the smoke. you want everything. you want something from them if they were there the day ahead of time, two days ahead of time. you want a complete coniology of the event.
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the reason for that, people were taking images of their friends, their family, taking video of the runners. somebody in the background was carrying the bomb into the scene. maybe more than one person. they won't know that. you want the authorities to have the best evidence. you want them to be able to go through it at their leisure with their coordinated approach so they're not leaving anything behind. you're not going to be able to separate the noise from it. you get everything and after that, you begin to find suspects or begin to target people by you know, by males with backpacks, as simple as that. and you start collecting everything.
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>> i want to bring into the conversation, former atf special agent in charge, james cavanaugh. he retired in 2010 after more than 30 years. was the lead investigator on the atlanta olympic bombings. the last time there was a bombing whose basic facts, not perpetrator, was the centennial park bombing. it was a high security, outdoor sporting event with a huge public presence. the weapon used was a pipe bomb and one person was killed by 111 were injured. james, i guess the question to you was how do you begin trying to track down who did this? obviously, there's a wealth of data presented in those pixels. pete williams talked about getting the fragments of the pressure cooker. where are you going igt rooigt now if you're an investigator? >> chris, the way this work is this investigation is basically an iceberg. the part you see is the small top.
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the agents and detectives on the ground in boston picking up the fragments of the bomb debris, picking up the bomb components. they're going to the hospital, retrieving component parts from victims, from doctors and they're putting that device together and their going to be able to put that device together. it's going to be able to be put together. like humpty dumpty. >> piece by piece. within 98% of the original, actual device. >> atf and fbi and bomb squad detectives have been blowing things for up 50 years. we blow up cars and everything in between and sift through and pick them up. we live to find out what that stuff is. these two scenes, as devastating as they are to boston, they are not huge scenes for agents to
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process. they're not the '93 trade center, not even the olympic park bombing. they're smaller. these bombs were made with hate. they were intended for mass murder. but the desire of the bomber would be his undoing, their undoing and that desire is for attention and terroristic theater. that's why they went there. because the cameras were there. because the world can watch there and that's why the terrorists, where ever they came from, and we can talk about all those places they can come from. they went there for that reason. so that will probably be their undoing because they are going to be on the cameras, all the reporters that were there. the forensics will layer that on. we talk about a slow moving case, but we're 24 hours into the case. and look what we know publicly.
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we know it's a pressure cooker. ball bearings. we know -- >> is that encouraging to you? >> extremely. smokeless powder, maybe a circuit board. you got two pressure cookers. anybody know anybody who bought two pressure cookers? you might have a film from walmart or home depot and you can layer that on with your photographs, your forensics and put it together. this case is going to be solved. >> let me ask you this, both of you gentlemen, briefly. if it is a single individual, we don't know if it was an individual or group, but it being a single individual, has not been ruled out by anything we know so far, does that make it a harder case to solve? clearly, there are cases, the uni bomber and eric rudolph, that took a very long time to solve. does it make it a more difficult case to solve if you are dealing with an individual as opposed to a group? >> well, not necessarily. because you know, when you're on
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your own, you're alone. not only do you have to make the fusing and firing system, you have to purchase the components, deliver the device. you've got a chance of being seen. then you could have a couple of conspirators of multiple conspirators as well. >> all right, grant fredricks and james cavanaugh, thank you both for your time tonight. i appreciate i. coming up, more on the national reaction to the attack. we'll be right back. ♪
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will we refused to be terrorized or do we risk looking at categories of people in sometimes uncharitable ways? we'll talk to someone who's got a firsthand perspective, next. [ female announcer ] switch to swiffer 360 dusters extender, and you'll dump your old duster. but don't worry, he'll find someone else. ♪ who's that lady? ♪ who's that lady? ♪ sexy lady, who's that lady? [ female announcer ] swiffer 360 dusters extender cleans high and low, with thick all around fibers that attract and lock up to two times more dust than a feather duster. swiffer gives cleaning a whole new meaning. and now swiffer dusters refills are available with the fresh scent of gain. using night-vision goggles to keep an eye on my spicy buffalo wheat thins. who's gonna take your wheat thins? i don't know. an intruder, the dog, bigfoot. could you get the light? [ loud crash ] what is going on?!
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about tomorrow. here's to good decisions. who matters most to you says the most about you. at massmutual we're owned by our policyowners, and they matter most to us. ready to plan for your family's future? we'll help you get there. breaking news on the third fatality from the bombing of the boston marathon. tonight, the chinese consulate general confirms that a chinese citizen was killed in yesterday's explosion. family has asked that the victim's personal information not be disclosed. while the nation's attention has been focused on boston, there is other news happening. one of those other stories that has been easy to lose track of was a report released today on what at first by what might appear to be an utterly unrelated topic.
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a panel put together by the constitution progress this morning made public a 577-paged report on the united states' use of torture on president bush. the report says it is quote indisputable that the united states engaged in the practice of torture. congressman hutchinson, jones, spearheaded the two-year investigation. what "the new york times" calls the most ambitious attempt to date to assess the detention and interrogation programs. the report found no firm or persuasive evidence that torture produced vital information that couldn't have been otherwise legally obtained and confirms new torture the cia has not admitted to. it says it damaged the standing of our nation and potentially increased the danger to u.s. military personnel taken captive. we look back at the torture regime and rightly bemoan the
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lack of accountability from george w. bush to dick cheney to david addington and john ewe. the entire culture and society shifted in a dark direction. dick cheney said famously and ominously, we would have to work the dark side. he was giving voice to a voice being articulated in our papers and cable news channels. i remember the second tower has hardly fallen when i started reading commentators openly contemplating or advocating for torture. the suspension of due process and all kinds of harsh draconian measures. ultimately, the people responsible for the torture regime are the government officials who made the key decisions, but the fertile soil into which the seeds of torture were planted were provided by the commentators, pundits and law professors who made it seem acceptable in the minds of the public in the wake of 9/11.
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that is why the after math of an event like boston, we have a duty to fight the darkest impulses in ourselves, in our fellow country men and women, to make clear to our leader that is we desire security and justice and the application of the rule of law. that there is no reason that our remarkably capable law enforcement officials and courts can't handle apprehending, trying and convicting the perpetrators of this slaughter and it is why i was so angered and disappointed when i saw david weigel report that susan collins said this today. what do we do once we capture the individual? how is he treated, if he's an american, then the constitutional protection pertain. if he is a foreign national, he should be held by a military tribunal and not read his
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miranda rights. yes, susan collins, a voice of reason and bipartisan reason. telling reporters that if the person apprehended happens to be a foreign national -- what a disgrace and what an insult to the american system of justice. and what ignorance. the fifth amendment of the constitution which protects the right to due process is quite clear about who it applies to. it reads no person shall be held to answer for capital or otherwise infamous crime unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury. nor be deprived of life, liberty of process. not no citizen, no person. french national is arrested in a bar fight, he gets access to a lawyer, is arraigned, charged and tried. we don't have some special carve out in the law for foreigners. our laws are our laws.
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and yet 12 years after the horrors of 9/11, we created a new special carved out area of law. we have a republican rushing to repeat the same mistakes, to place the perpetrators outside of our normal league system. susan collins should take the time to read the report. it is a useful, timely reminder of how not to react to mayhem. we'll be right back. [ male announcer ] when you're at the corner of "multivitamin" and "multiple choice,"
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president said it best this morning when he outlined the approach to the bombing, which so far seems to be the approach most people are taking. >> we will find whoever harmed our citizens and we will bring them to justice. we also know this. the american people refuse to be terrorized. because what the world saw yesterday and the aftermath of the explosions were stories of heroism and kindness and generosity and love. >> that phrase, refuse to be terrorized, caught me because last night, i read this. when we refuse to be terrorized, the terrorists fail even if their attacks succeed. attacks like yesterday's are extremely rare here in america and your odds of dying in one are far lower than dying from just about anything else, still, when something like this happens, people absolutely understandably get jumpy and any
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unattended suitcase automatically becomes a suspicious package. >> maybe you see something suspicious, but you don't want to get involved. it's nothing, you think. can you be sure? if you see something, say something. report suspicious activity to local authorities. >> so, in the aftermath of something like yesterday's bombing in boston, i'm curious to know how we remain alert. joining me now is bruce schneider, the chief security. we have charlie pierce still with us from newton. bruce, you've written about this a lot. about the kind of ways in which we've responding to 9/11 and what we call security feeder. when something like this does happen, people are going to be more alert, right? and the authorities are telling them to report things and there's some information that we need to get out of those folks,
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so how do you balance that with not overwhelming authority in the lower 48 have we been seeing reports with suspicious package reports and actually enter up enveloping more resources that necessary? >> well, i think the trick is to be local. in the boston area, we want to overwhelm the police. they don't know what's going to be valuable. they want everything. in the rest of the country, it's business as usual. so overwhelming the police there is going to have the same derogatory effect it had over the past 12 years. >> has see something, say something, been an effective tool? >> it hasn't. we've learned that the fbi investigates thousands of things and they're all false alarms and it used to hit the news. someone dumping their trash, someone with a badge at boston
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logan airport. these are amateurs we're asking. not security professionals. they're not police. when you ask amateurs to be on the front line of your security, you get amateur security. generally, we know what's suspicious. we don't need to be prompted. if something is truly suspicious -- >> it will rise up within you to this level. charlie, and bruce, i want to talk about this discussion of the word, terror, terrorism, terrorist, which there's been i think some kind of silly political debate about it, but it actually seems material to me in terms of how we all conceive of what's happening, right? it's material, charlie, in terms of what legal regime we're going use in this day and age often as we see susan collins. >> such as it is. >> right. here is the official state department definition of terrorism, which i think is
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really important here. premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by sub national groups or clandestine agents. fbi. the unlawful use of force or violence against persons of property to intimidate or coerce a government. civilian population and charlie, you've said that thing to me yesterday was profound, which is that terrorism is in the eyes of the terrorized and i'm wondering whether boston will feel more or less terrorized depending on what motivations we ultimately find out were responsible for the murders that we had there yesterday. >> i don't have, in situations like this, i always tell the story of a friend of mine who grew up on the falls road in belfast and was in boston and was walking to boston garden one time to sing "the national anthem" at a celtics game and as he was walking, the guy jumped out and said give me your money, i have a gun. my friend from belfast said, sir, if you have a gun, you produce it. i've taken that as my attitude towards this thing. as bruce said, if it happens to
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you, it is going to happen to you. it is a bolt from the blue. now, your question is an interesting one. because i have not seen so far in the reaction a predisposition to be overly angry at a specific political motivation, no matter what that is, at least in the city of boston so far. i think we've had the case of the saudi national student who has been exonerated and the fiery rhetoric around that took place mostly far from the city. and again, i give credit to commissioner davis for stepping op that story at the press conference. >> and we're going to play some sound from governor patrick. that's a fantastic story. thank you for joining us tonight. stick around. we'll be right back. this is for real this time. step seven point two one two. verify and lock. command is locked. five seconds.
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three, two, one. standing by for capture. the most innovative software on the planet... dragon is captured. is connecting today's leading companies to places beyond it. siemens. answers. senator roger wicker of mississippi released a statement about news of a letter addressed was intercepted and initially tested positive for ricin.
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quote, this matter is part of an on going investigation by the u.s. capitol and fbi. want to thank our law enforcement officials for their hard work and diligence in keeping those of us who work in the capitol safe. again, in initial testing, a letter bound for senator wicker's office tested positive for ricin. we'll keep you posted as this news develops. with the spark miles card from capital one, bjorn earns unlimited rewards for his small business. take these bags to room 12 please. [ garth ] bjorn's small business earns double miles on every purchase every day.
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right now, i want to bring in farrah stockman and aziza ahmed, who writes about changing global landscape of muslim minorities. i've been speaking to friends of mine who are arab an muslim an this kind of sense of tension as the investigation unfolds about finding the community in the cross hairs or under scrutiny if at some point, it is revealed there is a suspect who is arab or muslim. i'm curious in boston, how things feel to you.
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>> i do think after any one of these tragedy, that we're faced with, we want someone to blame and the muslim community does feel under pressure and under stress. the immediate finger pointing towards the saudi national does point to how the conversation may go. >> bruce, tell me how do you deal and farrah, i want to get to you in a second. people have this kind of ambient anxiety and then so searching for things. there's this mismatch in the supply and demand of information. like what do you do with the stuff that's there that's the anxiety? >> you have to recognize it. human beings are natural pattern matching machines. we look for stories. now, there's not a story we're going to make it, that's why conspiracies are so enticing.
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the only thing we can do is pay attention to it and understand we don't have any facts, that a lot of this is pure speculation and not to act on it. >> farrah, boston marathon is a tremendously cosmopolitan event. and i wonder how st city is reacting in that respect. >> this was not just an attack on boston. it was an attack on the whole world and yesterday, i was down at the scene and you saw people from all over the world helping each other. there were runners from all over the world who ran an spectators and now, we see the third victim was a chinese national. a woman, graduate school. i think it's important to focus on that because we are all the victims of this attack and if we keep our minds on that, we can avoid scapegoating one group of people. >> what do you want to see happen in terms of the way authorities talk about the investigation? what cues are you looking for?
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deval patrick had some strongly worded comments. >> i think governor patrick is right. we can't scapegoat, jump to conclusions, as has been done. we need to proceed with caution and focus on the local. i would say we need to think about what's happening in boston and not turn this into a situation that it isn't. >> bruce, you talked about pattern, humans are these pattern matching machines, which we are. specifically in moments of chaos or anxiety. pattern matching is what we want the experts to do, right, but amateur pattern matching is a whole different kettle of fish. >> right. it's so easy for us to look for conspiracies. it's easy to find us versus them. boston, mast massachusetts, the or the whole world. you treat these as criminals and it's a crime against the world. not against the country.
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not against a race. not against a language. and if we do that, we will stick together and find the bad guys. >> we're also going to be finding out more about the motivation, ultimately, we hope as the suspect is tracked down, apprehended and arraigned, tried. thank you for coming in. that is all in for this evening. rachel maddow starts now. >> the reason you cannot bring